Mercedes-AMG Motorsport and Iron Lynx strike out at the 24 Hours of Le Mans

Mercedes-AMG Motorsport’s customer squad Iron Lynx rolled three Mercedes-AMG LMGT3s into the 94th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, but the French classic delivered only disappointment. The #61 entry of Rui Pinto de Andrade, Martin Berry and Maxime Martin suffered a heavy front-right impact on the opening lap, then required repeated pit-lane repairs before retiring in lap 65. The #79 car, shared by Matteo Cressoni, Lin Hodenius and Johannes Zelger, lasted until the small hours when a misjudged curb strike by Hodenius ruptured the engine’s sump, forcing an immediate stop. The #62, run by Qatar by Iron Lynx with Giuliano Alesi, Abdulla Al-Khelaifi and Julian Hanses, lost significant time with a loose rear-suspension mount and limped home 16th in class. All three cars carried the Silver Arrow-inspired livery first seen in 2023. In the supporting Michelin Le Mans Cup on Friday, the GetSpeed-run Mercedes-AMG GT3 #14 finished runner-up with Anthony Bartone and Steve Jans at the wheel. Mercedes-AMG Motorsport head Stefan Wendl admitted the weekend fell short of expectations despite thorough preparation, pledged urgent root-cause analysis and congratulated GetSpeed’s podium, Toyota’s overall win, Inter Europol Competition’s LMP2 victory and Corvette/TF Sport’s LMGT3 class triumph. Iron Lynx driver Maxime Martin called the early contact and subsequent issues “the way motorsport goes,” while Lin Hodenius apologised for the curb strike that ended his race.